WordWealth: intransigent

in·tran·si·gent , adj.

Despite the mediator's best efforts, the opposing sides in the dispute remained intransigent. —— Merriam-Webster

Now in the catbird seat, the Players Association offered an olive branch to the vexed owners. Instead of demanding a strict interpretation of the Seitz ruling, the union agreed to a modified version wherein a player had to be in the major leagues six years before attaining free agency. After six years, players are able to sign with the highest bidder. In the 1980's and 90's, the balance of power in baseball shifted from the club owners to what has become one of the nation's most intransigent trade unions. As the American union movement struggled to keep its head above water, the Players Association won strike after strike. In 1998, Congress passed and President Bill Clinton signed the Curt Flood Act, which repealed that part of the antitrust exemption dealing with labor relations. The repeal was more formal than real, of course, because for all practical purposes the players had already taken care of that little matter all by themselves. ——Lawrence S. Ritter; 'Show Me the Money'; New York Times; May 25, 2003, Sunday

Kissinger is a highly self-conscious writer, and he knows when he is appearing a little too admiring of Le Duc Tho. At one point, the two men wrestle with the common problem of an intransigent South Vietnamese president, Nguyen Van Thieu (unrepresented at the secret Paris peace talks). Le Duc Tho helpfully suggests that if elections won't work to replace Thieu, then maybe assassination will. ''The vehemence of my refusal produced one of the few occasions when I saw Le Duc Tho temporarily flustered,'' Kissinger reports. —— Evan Thomas in 'Why Were We in Vietnam? He'll Tell You'; New York Times; March 23, 2003, Sunday

He was intransigent at times, and almost playfully yielding at others. —— 'The Decline and Fall of a Sure Thing'; New York Times, Sept 10, 1989

Sometimes I was intransigent, and proud of it. At other times I seemed to myself to be nearly devoid of any character at all, timid, uncertain, without will. —— Edward W. Said; 'Out of Place: A Memoir'

The dispute brewed through the summer as Nehru remained intransigent and U.S. officials confronted an unbending legal mandate. —— George Perkovich, 'India's Nuclear Bomb'

Did you know? (Mirriam-Webster)
English speakers borrowed "intransigent" in the 19th century from Spanish "intransigente" ("uncompromising"), itself a combination of the familiar prefix "in-" ("not") and "transigente" ("willing to compromise"). "Transigente" comes from the Spanish verb "transigir" ("to compromise"), which in turn comes from Latin "transigere" ("to come to an agreement"). The French have a similar verb, "transiger," which also means "to compromise." You may wonder if the word "transigent" exists in English, and the answer is "not really." It has seen occasional use, but it is not well established. There is, however, one other common English word that traces from Latin "transigire"—"transact," meaning "to conduct (business)."